Instant Pot Gajar Halwa – Vegan Carrot Halwa Recipe

Instant Pot Gajar Halwa – Vegan Carrot Halwa Recipe. Carrot Halwa is an Indian dessert, a flourless Carrot Cake Crumble/pudding that is spiced with cardamom and served during festivals. Vegan Gluten-free Soy-free Recipe. Jump to Recipe

Gajar Halwa is a popular Winter-Spring dessert in Northern India. My Dad’s fave version has grated carrots that get slow roasted in a skillet over hours to become almost candied and the mix is more like a soft crumble. See my Stove top carrot halwa version here. This Instant pot version cooks within minutes and works amazingly.

The Carrots get roasted with sugar for a bit then pressure cooked, then roasted again to dry them up. This Instant Pot Halwa will cook to a softer more pudding like state, and gets close to the stove roasted one after sitting for a bit to cool. I use purple and red carrots for the gorgeous color that would normally show up only on long roasting. To make this nut-free, use sunflower seed meal and omit the cashews. Make this delicious dessert for Holi (the festival of colors coming in March) or valentines day (use more purple carrots!) 🥕🥕. See video above the Recipe.

I know what you are thinking, that the Serving size should be 1 ;). Well, the 4 serves are dessert portions. Serve after a good meal! If you make this, do let me know how it turned out! Subscribe to My Youtube Channel for more videos.

Close the lid. Pressure cook for 6 to 7 minutes manual, hi in Instant pot. (3 mins over medium heat in stove top pressure cooker). Let the pressure release naturally. Open the lid, Mix in the cardamom. Taste and adjust sweet if needed.

Put the pot on Saute and cook the mixture for 3 to 4 mins to roast it well and to dry out the liquid. Stir well in between to avoid sticking. At this point you can add another 2 tsp vegan butter and mix in. Once the mixture starts to stick and is dry-ish. Switch off and let it sit. The pot will be hot for a while, let the carrot mixture slow cook in the heat for 15 mins or so. Stir once in between. When the mixture is warm-cool, serve, or store refrigerated. Garnish with chopped cashews or pistachios to serve. Stove top version here.

Recipe Notes

For additional mava flavor, add a 1/4 tsp nutritional yeast with the salt.

To make this nut-free, use sunflower seed meal instead of almond meal, and omit the cashews.

Comments

This looks delicious and I would like to try it but I find the amount of liquid is very low for an IP. Is 1/4 almond milk cup correct? Or do the carrots provide enough liquid to bring the pot to full pressure?

The carrots release moisture during cooking so it works out fine. If you see the video, right after opening , there is some moisture with the carrots about 2 tbsp or so. Thats why it gets sauteed for a few minutes to cook that out. If you feel like your carrots arent juicy enough, try with a 1/3 or 1/2 cup liquid.

I absolutely LOVED carrot halwa, especially when made fresh at Indian restaurants! I had no idea that they were made with butter, so I felt a bit more guilty about it after I found out. Thank you for this incredible vegan alternative! <3

When i made the video, I reshot the almond meal part as i had forgotten to add that, so the mixture dried out for another 2-3 mins and then i closed the lid and it still worked. I have noticed that sometimes the IP takes longer to come to pressure for various reasons. So if your unit by your experience takes longer or generally needs some extra liquid, then add some more. the extra liquid can be cooked out later on saute.

Maybe try doing the pot in pot method. You could put a couple of cups of water in the bottom of your IP and put a stainless steel ring or trivel and then put a small stainless steel mixing bowl on top of that.

yes. There is a squash halwa that uses opo squash which is similar to zucchini and its a similar process so it should work. Add some thick cashew cream when you saute mixture after opening the lid for a creamy halwa.

It turned out so good with the zucchini! They are very wet so there was plenty of liquid. I used coconut sugar instead of cane and I did add some cashew cream as you suggested. My husband and son loved it as well. We will definitely be adding this super easy vegetable dessert to our rotation. Thanks so much! I really am so grateful that you do what you do. It makes it easy to cook healthy vegan food for my family without having to rely on packaged foods. So many of your recipes are just part of our days now.

Awesome! i think with zucchini, no milk during pressure cooking will work too. So glad everyone loved it! And thank you for the wonderful note. I am happy that you try out the recipes and they turn out well!

Full Recipes(Ingredients, method), and post content CANNOT be reproduced or copied in any form for commercial purposes (on websites, blogs, in print) without permission. For photography usage, please email and ask.

Affiliate Links Disclosure: Some product links on some posts are affiliate links. Vegan Richa is monetized in part through the use of affiliate links. This means that if you were to click on a link that is an affiliate link, and/or purchase an item after clicking on that link, I may receive a percentage of the sales price. I only recommend products that I love and use often. Thank you for your support!